It is time to shine a light on the Islamic State’s hidden executions

A soldier from the Iraqi Security Forces ran out of ammunition in the midst of a firefight with Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) forces in Fallujah, Iraq in May of last year. After being wounded the soldier was captured by ISIL, paraded around as a prize, and—in a scene reminiscent of the four U.S. contractors killed in 2004—was hung from Employees’ Bridge in Fallujah.

On November 13, 2014, 16 members of the Sunni Arab Albu Nimr tribe were abducted from their homes by ISIL near Tharthar Lake in Anbar province. With one woman and two children among them, the tribal members were driven to Shtyah area and all were summarily executed by ISIL fighters. Their crime: being related to Sahwa militia fighting ISIL near Hit.

The level of brutality exhibited by these executions is unlikely to shock many. Similar stories of ISIL’s atrocities have been widely reported for over two years now. However, there is a surprising difference between the two events described above. While the execution of the Iraqi soldier was proudly posted to social media by ISIL, the executions of the family members of Sahwa militia fighters was hidden. The only reason I can report the atrocity is because of a United Nations mission to investigate human rights violations in Iraq. What also may come as a surprise is that this pattern of disclosure and non-disclosure of executions follows a distinct pattern by ISIL in Iraq. The reasons for the pattern may point to an effective way to dissuade people from joining ISIL.

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Scott B

If we are. . we dispatch them with the same brutality and extreme prejudice. . period.

Mustang Voodoo1

Agreed! I can only pray we are never exposed to these third world horrors in the CONUS

Mustang Voodoo1

The only thing more monstrous than the brutality shown to OUR people by the vermin that is DAESH, including journalists James Foley, Stephen Sotloff, and my Army brother, Army Ranger Peter Kassig who were beheaded with a FUCKING knife.........
are the monsters hiding inside each and every one of us! I believe this to my core. I don't mean just those of us who are military veterans, but everyday Americans.
If things ever go south in the CONUS, watch how fast former "normal people" will turn on each other. By this I mean law abiding folks. People will kill their neighbor for a bottle of water. Don't think so? Just wait!
....And then it starts, what would you do to someone who just killed your mother for the bottle of water? I know exactly what I would do and so do every single one of you...
I remember early during the invasion of OIF when a young Marine was caught on video killing an injured Iraqi soldier who was playing dead. The journalists on scene pushed that video to the masses and there were calls for that Marine to be taken into custody and charged with murder....
Yet folks didn't know that this happened to the Marine Corps and Army just hours and days prior to this video where guys, guys just like your best buddies who are dead because of walking into a room with allegedly dead Iraqi soldiers, who shot the Marines/Soldiers in the back. Yet even so, those back home still demand repurcussions for that Marine, as we are civilized people.
Their is a killer inside each and every one of us, it is inherent to the human condition. All that is needed is to take away hope, running water, electricity and the monster will come to the forefront. Here in the states we have safe spaces for college students who experienced the horrors of some slight, a bad grade, a look, a comment, some perceived micro-aggression.
In Iraq and Syria, the "safe spaces" are few and far between, but these safe spaces are for men, women, children to hide from the vermin we know as DAESH. Ever give a brother a hearty hug, a consoling hug? In Iraq and Syria, do that and you just may buy yourself a quick trip off of a 3 story roof, blindfolded and hands bound.
Group of guys playing football (soccer) during evening prayers....there's a video of 18 young men who did just that, they were all marched to the ledge of a river, forced to keep their heads down, hands on the shoulders of their friends, one by one marched another 10 feet and a .45 slug in the head, one by one, in full view of the 18 then 17 then 16 then down to the last guy, could any of you imagine that kind of dread?
Absolutely horrific, yes?
Well, the truth is, those poor souls, doomed to execution, by fall or by a bullet, yes they suffered the horrors of impending death, but the sad truth is these human beings were in fact the lucky ones! What? How so? Because aside from the horror of counting the minutes, seconds, steps until their death, for them, death was instantaneous...
Think about the brave Muslims of the Kurdish Peshmerga, or even some of the US trained Iraqi Special forces willing to pick up a rifle and fight the vermin we know as DAESH....
Now I don't often see Iraqi SOF running around with AK47's, WW2 issued pineapple grenades or those little truncheon shaped grenades German soldiers chucked at allied soldiers (most Iraqi SOF are carrying American supplied small arms) but those PESH boys, they are running with 40 year old AK's and Vietnam era webgear.
Well some might have a decent primary (ala' battlefield pickups) Anyway, the vast majority of those AK's will have a little metal clip on the barrels. Contained in those clips (understand I mean actual clips NOT magazines) is a single round, a 7.62x39 round. Well, those single rounds are about the best insurance policy any of the PESH guys are EVER going to have.
Those rounds are their magic bullet....if capture is imminent, they will not hesitate to take the quick painless death. Because if they are captured, they will go out any number of ways....forced to lie down as an ancient T54 Russian tank goes over their feet legs pelvis and slowly roll onto their chests. Maybe they will be doused in petrol and put into a cage and have a 500 feet petrol trail where someone lights it and they are roasted alive. Maybe in those cages, now suspended, with four of your warfighter brethren with you all of you doomed to the fate of being dunked in a pool, and drowned.
Probably the worst way to die and the horror of knowing you are going to be beheaded.....not with a swift blow from a Samuria sword but a butcher knife or a USMC fighting knife. Hands bound behind your back, if you have hair, it is being used to hold you still as they cut at your neck. Those of their brethren who are able to scream, as their vocal chords are cut the screams gets higher in pitch which then fades into gurgles. Particularly sadistic is these vermin we know as DAESH, often times hold beheading classes. In truth, beheading a human being is not easy, in mind nor spirit. But they teach methods which purposely avoid cutting the carotid artery and/or the jugular vein until the final moments of the execution. Why do they do this? Because once those blood supplies are cutoff to the brain, unconsciousness can begin within seconds. This is why the rear naked choke (MMA/JuJitsu) is so effective in defeating an opponent. Once the blood choke is set, your opponent can literally pass out before they can tapout.
In a beheading via knife, victims have been video'd clearly alive in some cases 30 seconds or more into the cutting. Conscious / aware of what is happening.
UNIMAGINABLE to think about this happening to you. Once you have seen one of these brutal executions on video, you are never the same
Many of our fellow Americans named above not only met this fate, they were often held for months and in some cases up to a year or more. Many folks have posed the same question once viewing these videos. How could James, Stephen, or Peter be so calm just seconds before being executed in such a horrific way?
Freed hostages have weighed in on this and all have reported that the American hostages were psychologically tortured for months prior to actually being beheaded. They were subjected to mock executions daily. Accordingly, this could be why they were so calm, maybe they assumed until the very last moment this was another mock execution
Every day Americans could not imagine such barbarism. Whilst it is true that today, such "in kind" retribution to the scourge that is DAESH is not supported by the general populace of the US, tomorrow is never far away....
Turning on a video camera / or smartphone video is simple, the mindset and stomach to actually dispatch another human being in such a manner is hidden inside even the most civilized people

Scott B

Jeremy. . your right. . no support for it. . .UNTILL it happens to some family member of a high ranking official somewhere. . this country has adapted the ''well if we just give evil a great big hug, it'll go away'' mentality. .which is extremely dangerous. . many of us have gone soft. . the problem is. . they haven't . . and are not going to. . barbarism should be fought with barbarism. . imho.

Jeremy A

Probably, but there's no (current) support in the US for "in-kind" retribution for atrocities. They deserve a hearing by their peers and such... :/ We did it to the Nazis, but now that seems barbaric to some. If anyone has visited the Holocaust museum in D.C. you'll know what I mean when I say: "No, it's not."